passes. Another. Come on. I’ve been away from Elias for at least an hour, and it will take me another half hour to get back to him. And that’s if this girl even has the Tellis. What if he has another seizure? What if he shouts or yells and gives away his location to someone happening by?
The door opens, and the girl is back, this time with a squat jar of amber liquid: Tellis extract. From behind the counter, she painstakingly pulls out another, smaller vial and looks at me expectantly.
I hold up both hands once, twice. “Twenty drachms.” That should be enough to last Elias a while. The child measures out the liquid with excruciating slowness, her eyes darting up at me every few seconds.
When she’s finally sealed the vial with wax, I reach out to take it, but she jerks it away, wiggling four fingers at me. I drop four silvers into her hands. She shakes her head.
“Zaver!” She takes out a gold mark from a pouch and waves it in the air.
“Four marks?” I burst out. “You might as well ask for the bleeding moon!” The girl just juts out her chin. I don’t have time to haggle, so I dig the money out and slam it down, holding out my hand for the Tellis.
She hesitates, her eyes darting to the front door.
I draw my dagger with one hand and grab the vial with the other, shoving out of the shack with teeth bared. But the only movement in the dark lane is from a goat gnawing on some garbage. The beast bleats at me before turning back to his feast.
Still, I am uneasy. The Tribal girl was acting strange. I bolt, staying away from the main thoroughfare and sticking to the muddy, poorly lit back alleys of the market. I hurry to the western edge of the Roost, so focused on looking back that I don’t see the dark, lean figure in front of me until I’ve run right into him.
“Pardon me,” a silky voice says. The stink of ghas and tea leaves overpowers me. “I didn’t see you there.”
My skin goes cold at the familiarity of the voice. The Tribesman. The one with the scar. His eyes lock with mine and narrow. “And what’s a gold-eyed Scholar girl doing in Raider’s Roost? Running from something, perhaps?” Skies. He did recognize me.
I dart to his right, but he blocks me.
“Out of my way.” I flash my knife at him. He laughs and puts one hand on my shoulder, neatly disarming me with the other.
“You’ll put out your own eye, little tigress.” He spins my dagger in one hand. “I am Shikaat, of Tribe Gula. And you are …?”
“None of your business.” I try to yank away from him, but his hand is like a vise.
“I just want to chat. Walk with me.” He tightens the hand on my shoulder.
“Get off me.” I kick at his ankle, and he winces and releases me. But when I dart toward the entrance to a side alley, he snatches my arm, and then grabs my other wrist, shoving up my sleeves.
“Slaves’ cuffs.” He runs a finger along the still-chafed skin of my wrists. “Recently removed. Interesting. Would you care to hear my theory?”
He leans close, black eyes sparkling, as if he’s sharing a joke. “I think there are very few Scholar girls with golden eyes wandering the wilderness, little tigress. Your injuries tell me you’ve seen battle. You smell of soot—perhaps from the fires in Serra? And the medicine—well, that’s most interesting of all.”
Our exchange has drawn curious glances—more than curious. A Mariner and a Martial, both wearing leather armor that marks them as bounty hunters, watch with interest. One approaches, but the Tribesman marches me down the alley away from them. He barks a word into the shadows. A moment later, two men materialize—his toadies, no doubt—and turn to head off the bounty hunters.
“You’re the Scholar girl the Martials are hunting.” Shikaat glances between the stalls, into the dark places where threats might lurk. “The one traveling with Elias Veturius. And there’s something wrong with him, otherwise you wouldn’t be here alone, so desperate for Tellis extract that you’d pay twenty times what you should for it.”
“How in the skies did you know?”
“Not many Scholars around here,” he says. “When one shows up, we notice.”
Damn it. The girl in the apothecary must have tipped him off.
“Now.” His smile is all teeth. “You’re going to lead me to your unfortunate